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I give him the look I give him when he’s being silly.

“The best what?” I ask, though I know exactly what he’s asking.

Joah and I have a standoff with our eyes, but he’s too proud to ask out loud what he’s wondering.

I raise my eyebrows. “Joah, if you have a question—just ask it properly.”

He closes his eyes tightly, in this funny, decided kind of way. “Fuck—nah, forget it. I’d have to top meself if I found out you shagged Brad Pitt and he were better at it than me—”

“Well.” I purse my lips. “ Better can be so subjective, because I mean, admittedly, he is very good in bed, but”—I gesture between Joah and me—“our chemistry is way better, so that makes everything better, you know?”

Joah takes a deep breath in through his nose, holds it, head falls back, eyes closed, face upwards towards the ceiling.

“Are you takin’ the piss? Like, was that a joke, or are you actually tellin’ me you fucked Brad Pitt?”

I frown at the sentence. “Well, ‘fucked’ comes across so terribly crude when you say it for some reason—”

“OH MY GOD,” Joah yells loud enough that the entire restaurant goes quiet and Aleki gets to his feet a few tables away—I flash him a smile and thumbs-up to tell him I’m fine and to leave me.

The whole restaurant keeps staring and Joah realises, and his spikes go up—which I’ve never seen before, not properly.

I’ve heard about it. Pixie told me he’s famously abrasive sometimes for literally no reason at all, and I suspect right now he feels at least a little bit justifiably entitled to whatever spikes he’s sporting.

He glowers at the faces staring at us.

“What the fuck are you lookin’ at?” he asks the room collectively, then zeroes in on a specific guy in his mid-twenties. “What the fuck are you staring at, mate? Eyes on your own plate”—he says the C-word, which I hate so I won’t be saying it, not even for you—“Fuck off.”

“Jo—” I touch his cheek, try to centre him to me. “Calm down.”

He nods a couple of times, but his eyes give him away—I’ll learn that more and more—that Joah’s eyes tell all his secrets and everything else he wouldn’t want you to know, and right now he’s frenetic.

He rubs his hand over his mouth again. “When?”

I shake my head. “It was one time—like a year ago, at Venice Film Festival—”

“Well, shit.” He sighs heavy. “That’s Legends of the Fall proper fucked up the arse, innit? Liked that movie, didn’t I? Brad fuckin’ Pitt, Ysolde—? Jesus wept. Think I’m gonna be sick—”

“Harrigan.” I tilt my head, trying to catch his eye. “You’re being silly. You asked me a question and—”

Jo swallows all heavy, something about his face is pitifully desperate but almost comically so? “Gonna need you to stop talkin’ now, Trouble, aren’t I? Like, fuckin’—I love you, Ys”—puts his hands on my cheeks when he says that but gives me a stern look—“but, just…leave it, yeah?”

“Joah—” I laugh. “Really—considering who I am and what my job is, is it all that terribly surprising? Like—who did you think my sexual partners were going to be? The shop boy in the garage?”

He stares at me, incredulous.

“Ain’t never fuckin’ thought about your shags before, have I?” He pauses, reconsiders. “Well, I have—just told meself they were all shit knockoffs of me but—”

I give him my most exasperated look to date. “You are such a bloody narcissist.”

Joah lets out this frustrated sound, then shoves his hands through his hair again.

“How the fuck’ve we ended up on this? This is the worst fuckin’ topic ever—Worst fuckin’ chat of me life. Who else—?” he asks me, then immediately clearly regrets it. “No. Fuck. Don’t tell me.” He pauses again. “Fuck it, tell me. Nah—don’t!”

I’m laughing now, and he’s glaring, though his eyes are finally starting to soften again.

“See what you do to me? I’m so in my fuckin’ head. Never in me head about girls, not ever—and then two weeks with you and I’m…I’m a proper melt now, that’s what I am—” He gives me a look. “Like, what the fuck are we even talkin’ about this for? How’d we get here?”

“Well.” I purse my lips. “I asked why you wouldn’t take me back to your place, and it really went downhill from there…”

“Alright, fuck it—” He sighs. “—while we’re down here, you got any other questions, then?”

I nod and he looks a bit surprised.

“Oh shit—didn’t think you’d say yes like—Alright, fuck—” He straightens up. “Go on, then…”

“Just one,” I tell him, and he lifts an eyebrow as he waits.

I press my lips into his just because I want to and I can—what a life—then I drape my arms around his neck.

“Is it true you trash hotel rooms?”

He cocks a little half smile—I think he thinks I’ll be impressed. “I’ve been known to trash a hotel room or two in my time.”

I lift my eyebrows. “Why?”

He shrugs. “Because.”

“Because why?”

“Because I can,” he says, as though that’s an answer, and maybe it is, but I don’t like it.

I trace the outline of his mouth with my thumb—it’s such a naughty mouth, it really does get him in a world of trouble. I have a feeling it will ultimately get me into many worlds of many different kinds of trouble also.

“You’d choose to destroy something merely because you can ?”

And that, I suppose to his credit, does give Joah some pause.

So I add, “ Can and should sometimes aren’t the same things. I dare say, very often are not the same thing at all…”

“Alright, kid—” Jo gives me little shove as he rolls his eyes. “Fuckin’ get down off that high horse—”

And—it’s strange, I can’t quite explain it—but suddenly, I’m nervous again. Different than before.

“Will you destroy me, Jo?” I ask him quietly, holding his eyes.

His head pulls back—the thought hurts him (or in the very least, offends him). “What?”

“Well, you could—” I tell him. “Could you not? One could argue I’ve given you that power. I love you, thus you have the capacity to destroy me.” I straighten up on his lap, chin held a little high. “Will you?”

He goes solemn as he leans in towards me. “You’re too beautiful.”

I rest my forehead against his as my heart sinks like a heavy old anchor to the deepest part of a dark seabed.

“That’s not a no,” I whisper to him.

Joah’s eyes lock on to mine, holds my face with his unwavering hands that are more steady than I fear he’ll ever be able to be, then he looks me clear in the eye.

“No,” Joah tells me.

And that—I’ll realise in eventual time—will be the first time that he lies to me.